I shrug. “He’s been doing a good job of handling them so far.”
Des nods. “But what if it gets to be too much and he decides the only way he can deal is to go away? Are you going with him? Would you be willing to leave your family and everything you know?”
“Do you know something I don’t?”
“We both know the same thing,” Des says. “Josh doesn’t like to be the center of attention—which, by the way, dude, has always seemed really weird to me for a guy who also wants to play lead guitar in a surf band—but the point is, push comes to shove, I can easily see him pulling a Kerouac and hitting the road.”
“I don’t think it will come to that,” I say. “Through all of this, Josh has been trying really hard to get his old life back.”
“I suppose.”
But then I get it.
“You’re not really worried about how I’m going to deal,” I say.
“I am so!”
“Okay. Except you’re also worried about getting left behind, yourself.”
“Maybe I am. Is that so weird? I’m the only one in our little band of superheroes without a superpower. Of course I’m going to get left behind because otherwise, I’ll be Jimmy Olsen, the kid that always needs to get rescued.”
“Batman doesn’t have superpowers and he seems to keep up just fine.”
“Yeah, but—”
“Just as you have so far. For one thing, Cory would never have found me if it wasn’t for you. I was the Jimmy Olsen in that dead city.”
He’s about to say more, except then we turn a corner and see city hall, the big stage with its “Humans for Humanity” banner and the flood of people all over the grounds. They’re still streaming in.
“Holy crap!” Des says. “I never knew there were that many people in Santa Feliz.”
My heart sinks at the numbers that Householder has managed to pull in, but then I notice that not everybody here is supporting the congressman. I see as many pro-Wildling signs as I do ones for Householder’s cause. The crowd is huge and the atmosphere feels charged and ready to blow.
I’m using the maps in my head to get a better sense of my surroundings, but there are so many people crowded around us that I have to dial my awareness way back. But even with the GPS tuned down, I’m getting a ton of information. Too much to sift through easily.
“I’ve never seen so many people,” Donalita says.
“Me neither. Except on TV. This is crazy.” I turn to look at her. “How are we supposed to find one whack-job in amongst them all?”
She looks as overwhelmed as I’m feeling, but then she shrugs and grins.
“We just start walking around,” she says, “and look.”
My gaze travels over the crowd. I spot Auntie Min’s crow soldiers easily enough. They’re on every vantage point—palm trees, light posts, rooflines. There are even a few of them on the edges of the big canvas canopy above the stage. I also spy local cops and state troopers, but there’s no sign of the FBI, or Chaingang’s crew. I could open my maps a little wider and find them, but that’s not who we’re looking for, anyway.
I offer Donalita my hand and she looks at it as though it’s some alien object.
“We don’t want to get separated,” I say.
There’s still a half hour before the rally officially starts. Up on the stage, techs are running around making last-minute adjustments. I finally pick out Matteson and Solana standing in a cluster of suits just by the wings on stage left. Then one of the suits moves and I see Danny Reed—Elzie’s friend from her activist days before we hooked up. The one that turned into a rat for the FBI.
That can’t be good.
I suppose the FBI has some kind of vetting process, but what if he’s still in contact with Elzie? What if he’s in on the plot to kill the congressman? Hell, what if he’s the assassin?
It seems so obvious that I can’t believe nobody else has twigged to it. But then I realize that I haven’t talked to either Matteson or Solana since I got back. They don’t know what I found out in the otherworld.
I reach in my pocket for my phone, but of course it’s not there. I can’t remember the last time I saw it.
“Do you have a phone I can borrow?” I ask Donalita.
“Sure.”
I wait a moment, but she doesn’t produce it.
“Um, can I borrow it now?”
“It’ll have to be later,” she says. “I don’t have it with me. I think I left it under Des’s bed.”
“What were you doing—never mind.” I grab her hand. “We have to get up to the stage,” I tell her.
She follows in my wake as I wade into the crowd. I must say “excuse me” a hundred times, but people move out of my way. When I pause for a moment to figure how to get through the next press of bodies, Donalita leans against my back.
“It’s so funny,” she says in my ear. “They’re all scared of you. They don’t know why, but they are.”
I turn to tell her that’s ridiculous, and bump into this huge guy standing beside me. If he’s not one of the crew who does weightlifting down on the beach, then he should go meet them because they’d get along just fine. He stiffens and starts to react, but before I can apologize, I see something change in his eyes. It’s not fear, so much as the look of a person who feels totally out of their depth.
“Sorry, man,” he mumbles and quickly turns away.
I turn back to Donalita.
“You’re a predator,” she says, speaking softly, so that her voice doesn’t carry. But I hear every word. “They can’t explain how they know, but la-la-la—they can’t ignore it, either.”
Great. So now I’m putting out a dangerous vibe, making people uncomfortable without even realizing that I’m doing it. Just one more thing to worry about.
But that’ll have to wait till later. First I need to warn Matteson about Danny Reed.
I push ahead through the crowd, very aware now of how people are shifting so that they don’t touch me as I pass. But I take advantage of it to work my way closer to the stage.
I’m not sure which part of the equation Fat Boy likes the least: backing down from us, getting into it with the state troopers or knowing that if he stays on course, he’s got a confrontation with Josh coming up. Which also means having to deal with los tíos, and I already know the hawk uncles have some weird hold over the Mexican gangs. When you add in the fact that the Kings are just plain loco, there’s no way to tell what he’ll do.
Turns out he opts for backing down. His eyes are spitting hate, but he’s got a big fake smile on his face.
“We’ll see you later, ese,” he says. “You have your fun today.”
He and Para move off through the crowd. I see the staties hesitate. Finally one of them trails along behind Fat Boy and his lieutenant, and the other watches us for a minute or so before moving on himself.
“What’s the deal with the bangers and these hawk dudes?” J-Dog wants to know.
“Beats me. But I’ve seen one of them use just a few words to stop a whole roomful of Kings about to blow.”
“You girls finished your pissing match?” Matteson asks through the earpiece.
“They teach you to talk like that in FBI school?” I ask him.
He laughs. “How’s it looking out there?” he asks.
“We’re shooting blanks,” J-Dog says. “Yo, homies. Talk to me.”
One by one the boys check in, but there’s dick to report. Nobody sees anything suspicious or out of the ordinary.
“Unless you count way too many honkies,” Dekker says, “got nothing better to do than whine about something that’s never going to be a for-real hassle in their whole lives.”
The crew laughs.
“Word,” Shorty adds. “Strictly First World problems.”
“How about you, Matteson?” I ask. “Anything?”
“One of Lalo’s boys ID’d the Wildlings on Householder’s detail as wolf guys from something he calls the Kickaha Blue Mountain Clan.”
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“Never heard of them.”
“Yeah, like I have,” Matteson says. “Lalo says a lot of them get into law enforcement and they’re loyal to a fault when it comes to their jobs.”
“Dogs, wolves,” J-Dog says. “What’s the diff? We’ve already seen how the dog clans play the game, so is this gospel?”
“The dog clans were under a binding,” Lalo says, irritation plain in his voice.
J-Dog sighs. “Yeah, yeah. We heard. Broken record, bro. You willing to take the chance on Householder’s life, seeing how you’re all set on keeping the douchebag alive?”
“I am,” Lalo tells him.
J-Dog looks at me and rolls his eyes.
“We’ll keep an eye on things up here,” Solana breaks in. “You keep doing the same out in the crowd. No news is good news.”
“Got it,” I say, then add to the boys, “You heard the man, homies. Eyes sharp, stay safe.”
J-Dog laughs. “Stay safe? What are you now—our den mother?”
I turn to J-Dog, but before I can say anything, I see them over his shoulder. Des and Marina, working their way through the crowd in our direction. My heart does a little jump. They catch sight of me at the same time and the welcoming smile that starts on my lips dies fast and hard.
Something’s wrong with Marina. Not physically. She looks fine. Mighty fine, if you want to know the truth. Whatever happened to her in the otherworld, she got through it in one piece. But there’s a big sadness in her eyes. Our gazes meet and I already know that everything has changed. I couldn’t tell you how or why, it just has. As if to confirm it, I see that Des—who always seems a little edgy around me anyway—is really putting out the anxious vibe. Like this is the last place he wants to be, and I’m the last person he wants to see. Normally he’s like a nervous puppy, eager to please, but as soon as he spotted me, he looked uncomfortable as hell.
And then I get it.
Cory. He must have told Marina about what went down with the dogs back at the compound. They’ve got a hate-on for any Aver, and if she’s part of their crew now, that puts us on opposite sides.
Fuck.
I reach up and turn off my earpiece.
“Bro?” J-Dog asks.
“I need a moment here,” I tell him.
He follows my gaze. “That your girl?”
“I don’t know,” I say.
I step away so that I can meet her out of his earshot. We stop a couple of paces away from each other, but it feels like we’re standing on opposite rims of the Grand Canyon. Des gives me an uneasy nod, then sidles to one side and pretends a great interest in the preparations on stage, leaving Marina and I facing each other.
I want to take her in my arms, but there are too many people around, and who knows which one is going to run off and rat us out to her mother. Plus there’s the look in her eyes. Even if we were alone, she might not want that.
I shove my hands in my pockets.
“Hey,” she says.
“I was worried about you.”
She gives me a small smile. “I was worried about me, too.”
“I heard you took on the big bad, all by yourself.”
“Sure,” she says. “If you can call turning invisible and shaking in my boots taking somebody on. I wouldn’t have survived a minute if Josh and the dog clans hadn’t stepped up to help me.”
“How’d that happen?”
“You mean, Josh? It was kind of a fluke. He didn’t even know I was missing, but he wanted to see me. He just went looking and there I was, in over my head.”
She’s looking at my shoulder instead of my eyes.
“No, I meant the dog clans,” I say. “Why’d they help you?”
“I freed them from the binding that this guy Nanuq had them under.”
“Good job,” I say.
She shrugs. “Anybody would have done it. Well, except maybe Donalita. She thought they’d turn on us, but just the opposite happened.”
“Yeah, I heard about that, too.” I hesitate, then add, “I guess Cory told you about what happened at the compound?”
She drops her gaze to her feet. “He did.”
A large portion of the crowd suddenly cheers, and then I hear Congressman Householder being introduced. Right now, I couldn’t care less about that piece-of-crap politician.
“I know he’s on my case about it,” I say, “but I’ve got nothing to apologize for. They came after me and mine. They took a run at my grandma.”
The crowd’s still going crazy, but we’re Wildlings. We could hear each other if a jet was going by right over our heads.
“I understand,” she says. “I might have done the same thing if they came after my little sisters, or Mamá.”
I get a little flicker of hope. “So we’re good?”
Maybe this weird vibe I’m getting is just because of everything she went through. But that dies with the next thing she says.
“I … not really, Theo. I just can’t do this gang thing.”
“But you’re part of the dog clan crew now, aren’t you?”
She shakes her head. “That’s their idea, not mine.”
“I can be done with the gang,” I tell her.
“This isn’t really the time or place to get into it,” she says.
“We need to talk when things calm down a little.”
“I’m serious,” I tell her.
“I know you think you are, but—”
“Holy SHIT!” I hear J-Dog yell behind me.
I turn, bringing my earpiece back online, and then everything goes to hell.
Even with the involuntary intimidation thing going for me, it’s taking too long for us to get through the crowd. It’s just too massive. I can’t see over the people in front of us. Then I hear Householder being introduced. I push forward, Donalita on my heels. We reach a spot where we can see the stage just as Householder steps up to the microphone. I don’t look at him. I’m too busy marking Danny’s position.
Except he doesn’t look particularly threatening. He’s standing with Solana, the pair of them scanning the crowd. Matteson’s on the other side of the stage. I spot four more guys in suits up there doing the same thing. I figure them for Secret Service.
But if Danny’s not the threat, who is?
I start to push forward again. I need to get to the stage so I can get a clearer idea of what’s going on. I know the assassin’s going to have to come in close because Auntie Min’s crows occupy every place a sniper would choose.
Almost there. I pull up the maps in my head, keeping the focus close—just the area around me and the stage. I mark the cousins and Wildlings, but except for Danny, none of them are close enough to be a problem.
The crowd keeps parting for me and finally I’m just a couple of rows of people away from the stage.
Everything still seems clear.
Donalita taps my back to get my attention.
“Stop growling,” she murmurs. “You’re freaking people out.”
I didn’t even realize I was doing it.
But the mountain lion feels my tension and he’s aching to wear my skin. He doesn’t like the crowd. He knows we’re hunting, but he’s frustrated because I can’t get a bead on our prey.
I start to push him down, but suddenly it happens.
A cousin appears in the press of people to the right of me, stepping directly from the otherworld to here. People stumble around, pushed aside by his appearance. I can’t see his face because of the hood he’s wearing. He’s small, but has a highpowered rifle in his hands. Someone screams. People scramble to get out of the way.
I’m aware of everything going on in the chaos. An Ocean Aver lunging for the guy. All the security on the stage reaching for guns. One of the Secret Service guys starting for the congressman. Householder looking startled, not knowing what’s going on, but aware that something’s wrong.
They’re all going to be too late.
I won’t be. I can’t get to the shooter in time, not with the pres
s of people. But I have another option.
I let the mountain lion out and leap for the stage so that I’ll be right between the congressman and the shooter.
I hear the crack of the shot.
My leap takes me directly into the path of the bullet.
Just before it hits me, I think, crap, this is really going to hurt.
Then the bullet punches into me, lifting me right off my paws, and it’s like my chest explodes.
I don’t have to ask J-Dog what’s going on—it’s all over my earpiece, everybody shouting at the same time.
“—he came from,” Tall Boy’s saying. “I’m not going to get to him in—”
“Take him down!” That’s Matteson.
J-Dog and I move fast, shoving our way through the crowd. I see the back of a dreadlocked kid and realize it’s Josh, just as he shifts.
“—The fuck?”
“Is that a mountain lion?”
Josh leaps on stage.
The sharp crack of a rifle cuts the air.
People start screaming and trying to run away from the stage, pushing against me in a wave.
J-Dog gets swept back, unable to fight the swarm, but they can’t stop me. They just bounce off me as they try to get away.
I see the mountain lion go down. By the time it hits the stage, it’s shifted back into Josh.
A Secret Service man flattens the congressman behind the podium, kneels above him, gun out and pointed at Josh.
Tall Boy’s on the shooter, wrestling with him. The gun goes off again, but the barrel’s pointed up at the sky. Then Matteson and another Secret Service man leap off the stage to help Tall Boy.
My gaze locks on Josh. He’s just lying there with an ugly hole in his chest, a pool of blood spreading out from under him.
Come on, bro, I think. I’ve seen you do this before in the barrio. You take the shot and you go down, but you get back up.
He doesn’t move.
What are you waiting for? I want to yell at him. Enough with dragging out the drama. Get up.
Get the fuck up!
But he doesn’t so much as twitch. He just sprawls there on the wooden floor of the stage, bleeding out.
Finally I reach the edge of the stage, but before I can climb up to get to Josh, the Secret Service man kneeling over Householder points his gun in my direction.